"Oh Lucy!" is that rare foreign-language social comedy that one should not arrive late for. The first 10 minutes find a mild-mannered Japanese office worker, Setsuko (Shinobu Terajima), waiting for one of her country's famous high-speed "bullet" trains when a gentleman behind her on the platform discreetly pushes by with a whispered "Goodbye," before leaping onto the tracks as the train barrels into the station.
Following this rattling event, our heroine, a lonely, chain-smoking Tokyo office lady well past her prime, decides to take an English class. The white male American instructor (somewhat-past-his-prime ex-hunk Josh Hartnett) gives our gal a new American nickname, Lucy. John, the teacher, operating under a sign that proclaims "English Only Zone," startles Lucy by wrapping her in his bear-like arms. "What can I say? I'm a hugger." He adds, "It's important to relax, because I teach American English, and in American English, when you speak it, you have to be lazy - lazy and relaxed." Then he pulls out a blonde wig. "I want you to wear this, it's the clincher." "Lucy" falls for the teach, who suddenly disappears. She pursues him to America, to a rundown San Diego motel complex.
Japanese-born/Noe Valley, SF-resident writer-director Atsuko Hirayanagi explains that in both her film-thesis short version and in the Sundance-awarded feature-length version of "Oh Lucy!" she set out to demonstrate how far a quiet, obscure office drone might go if given permission to vent. The film is photographed in a low-key, drab manner that emphasizes both the banal and surreally nutty aspects of Japanese office life and routines. Employees and supervisors are absurdly formal, and adults walk through the streets wearing white surgical masks, as if hoping to ward off an influx of plutonium.
"Oh Lucy!" is a 96-minute culture-shock excursion that's hilarious at times. Trigger warnings for the man jumping onto train tracks, a teen girl leaping off an oceanside cliff, much cigarette smoking, and a general sense of social disorder. The movie features both American-style English and conversational Japanese with English subtitles, mostly easy to follow. Its fans may also want to check out another cheeky Japan-centric oddball comedy, the 1995 feature "Cold Fever," in which a 20something Japanese businessman takes an Icelandic vacation to pay his respects to his deceased parents, who perished there in a weird accident. Opens Friday.